Dreamland

One of Iceland’s most influential and acclaimed documentaries, Dreamland is a feature-length film directed by Þorfinnur Guðnason and Andri Snær Magnason, based on Andri’s book Dreamland – a Self Help Manual for a Frightened Nation.

The film exposes the environmental and social costs of Iceland’s massive hydroelectric projects and aluminum smelting. Blending breathtaking aerial footage with political critique, it challenges the narrative of “clean energy” sold to the public, and explores how global corporations influence national policy at the expense of untouched wilderness.

Dreamland’s cinematic release broke Iceland’s documentary attendance records, which it still holds. Dreamland screened at major documentary film festivals world wide, and premiered internationally at IDFA. It won the Edda Awards for Best Documentary in 2009 and was nominated for Best Director, Best Sound, and Best Music. Dreamland also received the Cinema Politica Audience Award in 2010.

Dreamland is a film about a nation standing at cross-roads. Leading up to the country’s greatest economic crisis, the government started the largest mega project in the history of Iceland, to build the biggest dam in Europe to provide Alcoa cheap electricity for an aluminum smelter in the rugged east fjords of Iceland.

The film is an ode to a threatened landscape, with magnificent helicopter shots of breathtaking, rugged terrain where waterfalls, geysers and vast green steppes still abound — for now.

DIRECTORS: Þorfinnur Guðnason, Andri Snær Magnason
PRODUCERS: Sigurður Gísli Pálmason, Hanna Björk Valsdóttir
CO-PRODUCERS: Hlín Jóhannesdóttir, Hrönn Kristinsdóttir, Þórir Snær Sigurjónsson
EDITOR: Eva Lind Höskuldsdóttir
CINEMATOGRAPHERS: Þorfinnur Guðnason, Guðmundur Bjartmarsson, Hjalti Stefánsson, Bergsteinn Björgúlfsson
SOUND DESIGN: Kjartan Kjartansson, Björn Viktorsson, Huldar Freyr Arnarsson
MUSIC COMPOSER: Valgeir Sigurðsson
SCRIPT: Andri Snær Magnason
COLOR: Steinþór Birgisson

RUNTIME: 89 min
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: Iceland
WORLD PREMIERE: 8th April, 2009, Iceland
LANGUAGES: Icelandic, English
PRODUCTION COMPANY: Ground Control Productions in association with TC Films and Zik Zak Filmworks

IMDb
Watch Dreamland on Vimeo here
Listen to the soundtrack by Valgeir Sigurðsson here
Dreamland’s website

“This is one of the best environmental films ever made. An incredibly, moving, inspiring and fantastically political film that will make you want to be a better steward of this planet.” – Cinema Politica

★★★★★ “Once every five to ten years a film comes along that shakes your soul, rattles the cage of your conscience, and awakes you from a media-immersed cryogenic dream state … the audiovisual awakening is the magnificent breathtaking political documentary Dreamland.” – Art Threat

“… offers impassioned visual and rhetorical arguments that put the island nation’s environmental and financial problems in historical perspective. Illustrating how the government blithely sold precious natural resources to predatory multinationals and used economic fear-mongering to push the deals through without proper study or reflection.” – Variety

★★★★★ “Dreamland is an epic film on a world-scale, and a creative force into red-hot current affairs.”– H.S., Morgunblaðið

“The film is worth seeing for the visuals alone. The documentary is all the more exceptional given its ability to seamlessly weave a sense of poetic narrative with stark journalistic storytelling. The story is so well told that the film becomes its own cultural art form. It’s rare to find a documentary so complete and well-directed.” – The Concordian

★★★★★ “Straight to the point, the sharpest documentary ever in our humble history of cinema.” – O.H.T, RÚV

★★★★★ “What a scenery, what selection of old and new footage, what beauty in cinematography and music.
The film floats by under strong visual direction, and skillful research, there are no dead moments.”– E.E., DV